Something is cutting off Spohrville's communication with the outside world. The phones don't work. There's no radio, no TV -- no internet. Are eco-terrorists trying to shut down the Mars Relay satellite? That's what the government says, but Jordan and Helen and the sentient virtual supercomputer Cassandra don't believe a word of it. The town is overrun with "birdwatchers"Something is cutting off Spohrville's communication with the outside world. The phones don't work. There's no radio, no TV -- no internet. Are eco-terrorists trying to shut down the Mars Relay satellite? That's what the government says, but Jordan and Helen and the sentient virtual supercomputer Cassandra don't believe a word of it. The town is overrun with "birdwatchers" who can't tell a hawk from a heron. Jordan's old enemy, Harvey Number Two of the spy agency Bureau 6, is sneaking around pretending to be a cop on holiday. And archaeologist Uncle William has dug up a very strange black rock while excavating an Acadian settlement. With no land-lines to the site of the dig and wireless communication impossible, Jordan and Helen have no back-up from Cassandra. They've taken on corrupt government agents and industrial spies before, but they've always had Cassandra behind them. It's the twenty-first century. The bad guys have night-vision goggles and interference triangulators. How did Jordan and Helen get stuck with a bunch of musket-toting historical re-enactors as their only allies?...more

Mostly, I write fantasy (epic fantasy ... character-driven epic fantasy ... with shapeshifters, demons, gods, and ... Moth, around whom even the gods get a bit nervous). These days, I largely write for adults, though I've written many children's and YA fantasy novels and some children's science fiction, as well as picture books, plus I've been known to perpetrate literary criticism.

2014 is goingMostly, I write fantasy (epic fantasy ... character-driven epic fantasy ... with shapeshifters, demons, gods, and ... Moth, around whom even the gods get a bit nervous). These days, I largely write for adults, though I've written many children's and YA fantasy novels and some children's science fiction, as well as picture books, plus I've been known to perpetrate literary criticism.

2014 is going to be a busy year. Marakand, a two-volume epic fantasy set in the same world as Blackdog, comes out from Pyr, The Leopard in June and The Lady in the autumn.

My main scholarly interests are ancient and medieval history and languages, and the history of children's fantasy literature. What else can I say? My life is unexciting. I live with a wicked white husky-mix dog and aspire to an arboretum of my own.

Here on Goodreads, I'm only rating/reviewing books I've really liked a lot. Sometimes I rate with stars, sometimes I don't, but a book is only on my Goodreads shelves if I liked it. For serious critical analysis from me, you'll have to turn to Quests and Kingdoms or Beyond Window-Dressing....more